


Acid Painted Walls

by PeachWord



Category: White Collar
Genre: Domestic Violence, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sickfic, mentions of James Bennett, season 4, ulcer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-28
Updated: 2014-07-18
Packaged: 2018-01-21 02:45:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1534724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeachWord/pseuds/PeachWord
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal has an ulcer. Set post season 4.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The pain in his stomach was unbearable. It felt like there were thousands of little tiny people inside him shooting guns at his insides. He passed it off as a stomach ache, but when he couldn’t sleep that night from the tug inside his belly, and he swallowed three extra strength Tylenols and it still didn’t take away any of the hurt, he knew it wasn’t.

When he literally couldn’t stomach the pain anymore he thought about calling someone, but his phone was 2 feet too far. When the nausea settled in and finally exploded, he moved. He actually stood and stumbled four steps before the agony sent him to the ground. He was happy he landed on his face and not his back; he could have choked on the blood that he vomited.

**********

“Neal, this is my third voice mail. Call me back.” Peter sighed and hung up the phone, frustrated.

The last month had been increasingly hard on the younger man. All that business with his father really caught up with him. He couldn’t imagine what he had gone through, finally seeing the man who abandoned him as a child, then finding him under false pretenses, only to have him slip through his fingers right in front of him. And that way James Bennett left his son this time, Peter knew it would take more than a hug to put it past him.

Neal expectantly didn’t talk about it, but his actions spoke louder than words. Well, inaction in this instance. He was passive, sad, and quiet; especially yesterday. Yesterday at work he was so quiet that I wondered if he was even listening to me. I cut him a break though, told him to go home and get some sleep because it really looked like he needed it.

But now it was almost 10 a.m. and he was supposed to be here at 9, and he damn well knew that Neal Caffrey was never late.

By 11 and two more missed phone calls he decided to drive himself to June’s. He found a spot in the front and Ella, the house maid, let him in with a smile. She offered him espresso but he declined, telling her that perhaps he would take it to go when he left.

He knocked several times at Neal’s door but got no response. He let himself in and to his surprise found the room empty. He sighed again and took out his cell phone, hit the send button and waited for the voice mail. But it didn’t go to voice mail because he heard Neal’s familiar ring tone and followed the sound to the actual phone on the coffee table.

Peter took a look around the apartment; everything was in order, except the bed. The bed was unmade, sheets wrinkled, blanket overthrown, pillows everywhere. He had known Neal for years and knew he would never leave a bed unmade, it was one of his few quirks. Peter automatically went into Suit mode and trained his eyes to detect any more clues as to where his C.I. was.

Then he saw it, the fingers poking out from behind the frame of the bed, sprawled against the wood floor. “Neal?” He ran the 5 feet and his knees crumbled to the floor next to him.  Neal was on his side, blood on his hand, covering his mouth and t-shirt.

“Neal!” Peter shouted as he grabbed his arm. He felt for a pulse and found one. He took out his phone and dialed 911. They assured him they would be there in a few minutes and he yelled that wasn’t fast enough.

They asked him to stay on the line but he ignored them. “Neal! Open your eyes.”

He obeyed, opening them slowly. His face immediately contorted into discomfort. He grabbed at his stomach.

“Neal, what happened?”

He opened his mouth to speak but he couldn’t talk. He curled himself tighter into a ball and winced as he grabbed his stomach again. His breathing became erratic. Tears escaped his eyes as he screamed at the pain hitting him.

**************

“He has a peptic ulcer,” the doctor said.

“An ulcer did that?”

“Agent Burke, please don’t yell at me. But yes, ulcers come in various forms, this happened to be a bad one. I’m surprised he didn’t come in sooner, something like that, he should have been in a lot of pain.”

He sighed, again frustrated. Why didn’t he tell someone? He walked into Neal’s room expecting him to be asleep, but then again he should have learned by now to never expect anything from Neal except the opposite, this was no exception.

He was awake, his eyes looking lazily at the television; he definitely wasn’t paying attention to it.

“How you feeling?”

It took him a minute to register the words.“Better,” he responded.

“How long have you been feeling this way? God, Neal, you could have said something instead of me finding you like that.”

He didn’t answer, but why should he?

"I know you’ve been having a hard time since that whole thing with your dad and everything but, Neal, if you didn’t feel good, why didn’t you tell someone?”

Maybe his answer was the result of the morphine being pushed through his veins and he’d probably deny saying it later, but Peter knew he would never forget it.

“What my dad did to you, how he left me again, it hurt. It hurt so much. And my stomach hurt a lot too. I guess I just couldn’t tell the difference. I thought that’s the kind of pain you’re supposed to feel when your heart breaks.”

Peter didn’t ask him anymore questions after that.


	2. Chapter 2

Peter wouldn’t let Neal come to work for a week after he left the hospital. He knows he was trying to help but sitting around and thinking did the opposite. His back was also starting to hurt from lying on it for most of the day. The medicine the doctor prescribed him made nausea and tired. It didn’t help that he couldn’t have alcohol.

June kept him company, showing him old photos of her and Byron. She fed him cookies and lots of milk, but the sugar tasted too processed and the milk tasted too sour.

Neal sketched a lot during that week. For some reason he kept drawing hands. Infant hands with no traces of bitterness and then old hands wrinkled with the harshness of life that had lived through them. He drew my mother too, he doesn’t know why; maybe it was because he didn’t have any photographs of her and he wanted to see her face. She was pretty and although they didn’t have a lot of money growing up, she always looked elegant.

“There should be a lot less in here,” Peter stated as he picked up the bottle of pills.

“They make me feel sick,” Neal responded.

He sighed. “You’re going to feel sick if you don’t take them.”

Neal knew he was right, but he absurdly was craving the hurt the ulcer had gifted him. When he took the pills, all it did was numb the sharpness of the acid eating away at his esophagus and left him with nothing but the raw ridiculous pain that centered in his head and chest. “I’m fine,” he said.

“Dammit, Neal, do you want to end up in the hospital again?”

He shook my head; he didn’t want to bother him again like that.

“Okay, so take the pills,” he said as he laid two of them on the table.

He swallowed them dry.

“Hey, are you okay?”

He thought he didn’t hear him, but he did.

“Neal?”

“I hate him so much.”

He reached out to touch the back of his head, but Neal turned so he couldn’t.

“I know you do,” he said.

********

“Goddamn James Bennett,” Peter said aloud.

“Did you find him?”

“What? No, just thinking out loud, sorry hun.”

“How’s Neal feeling? Better?”

Peter shook my head. “I think he’s doing even worse than before he went to the hospital.”

“Invite him over for dinner.”

“Yea, that’s a good idea. Good company and a good meal should do him good.” He didn’t pick up the first time, or the second. 

“H’lo?” he said in a groggy tone.

“Sorry, Neal, didn’t mean to wake you,” Peter said as he glanced at his watch, it was only 3 o’clock in the afternoon.

“S’okay,” he answered.

“How you feeling?” He didn’t answer. “Neal?”

“I’m tired,” he answered through a yawn.

“El and I want to invite you for dinner tonight.”

“Thanks . . . I’m just . . . I just want to sleep.”

“C’mon, Neal, you’ll feel better if you get out of the house. I’ll even pick you up okay? I’ll be at your house at 6.”

********

At 5:30, Neal pushed himself out of the warmth of the blankets he was ensconced in. His bones felt like steel as he dragged himself to put on fresh clothes. He had a pounding headache and he knew it was from sleeping all afternoon. The pain in his stomach was faint, but he was happy it wasn’t as intense as last week. Though, a part of him longed for the ache.

At 5:45 there was a knock at his door. He rolled his eyes at Peter’s ability to be early for everything. “It’s open Peter.”

As Neal put the fresh shirt over my head, the person who had entered opened their mouth and spoke. “I know you’re mad at me, son, I would be too. You have no reason to forgive me--”

“Why the hell are you here?! Do you have any idea what kind of mess you put me in? What you put Peter through?”

“Please just let me explain--”

“No! You don’t get any more chances to explain. You lost that privilege the minute you left me and mom when I was three years old!” Neal yelled as he reached for his cell phone.

“Who are you calling?”

“The police. I should have called them the minute I knew you--”

“Son, please don’t do that. Please, I’m you father--”

“Oh. Now you want to be my father? After all these years, this is the moment you want to pick to magically be my father? Don’t you dare stand there and talk to me like you’re my father, you never were one to me!”

And then he did something that unfortunately Neal expected. He hit him. He hit him so hard across the face that he fell to the ground. His cheek burned with the hot anger from the contact with his fist, his eyes stung from the tears threatening to spill, his mouth was dry with fear and pain.

“Get out,” was all Neal said as he continued to lay on the century old wood floor beneath him.

“I’m sorry, Neal. Please, I don’t know why I did that,” James said as he stood over his son and held out his hand. Neal roughly pushed it away. He didn’t look at him, but his scent was that of whiskey.

His mood seemed to darken even further. “I guess I was stupid to come back here and try and explain things to you.”

“I guess you were,” Neal spat back.

Then he really lost it. “You little shit,” he grunted as he kicked Neal in the stomach. Neal curled into a ball but it didn’t hurt, it should have though. He grabbed him by the arm and pulled him into an upright position. He punched him in the nose and again Neal should have fallen but he held his arm so tight that he didn’t budge an inch.

Neal looked at him finally. His eyes were red and sweat glistened on face. “You don’t even hit back, I guess I do regret leaving you and your bitch mother, maybe then I could have taught you how to be a man,” he sneered.

Neal opened his mouth to speak and tasted the fresh blood pouring freely down my nose. “I hate you.”

“And I hate you,” he responded in an even calmer tone. Neal stepped back, back and back until he couldn’t go back anymore. His father's hands were quick as they encased themselves around his neck. He wasn’t even trying to scare his son, he was simply trying to kill him.

Neal tried to push those hands off, but every attempt was one more ounce of energy leaving his body and succumbing to his father's hands of death. Neal couldn’t even scream, that’s how hard his grip was. His blue eyes leaked tears of desperation and his face was surely red with fear. Neal slid to the floor as the screams and shouts from his father;s mouth ripped his eardrums.

As quickly as his hands were put on Neal, they were even quicker to be removed. Neal opened his eyes briefly to see Peter wrestling his father to the ground, handcuffs already in his hands. Neal wanted to help him, secure the old man and put him in his place, but he couldn’t; he was too dazed, too weak, and too sick to understand that his place wasn’t in jail but in hell with the devil himself.

Neal dragged himself away from the scuffle, crawling like a weakling to the other side of the room. He needed to get away, he couldn’t be near this. He soon felt gentle hands on him, hands he never felt before. They were Elizabeth’s. She was on her knees beside him, tears in her eyes and softly cooing that everything was okay, that Peter had his father handcuffed. She caressed his face, particularly the mark on his cheek and then ran her smooth fingers over uneven red marks that lined his neck. She said she was sorry, so sorry that he had to go through that.

Neal wasn’t sure if she was referring to this current encounter or his life in general.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the lack of updates! Enjoy.

“C’mon, open your eyes. That’s it . . . good.”

When Neal pried his salt crusted eyes open, he lazily closed them again.

“C’mon, Neal, please?”

Neal complied again. Peter was leaning forward in his chair. His eyes were big and encouraging.

He was about to open his mouth to ask where he was but Peter shook his head. “Shh, try not to speak; your vocal chords are . . . bruised.” There was defeat laced within that last word, perhaps it was anger. “You’re in the hospital, Neal, you’ve been here for the last six hours.”

Neal knew he should have felt pain radiating throughout his ribs and back, his nose, his throat. Maybe he should have felt the soreness in his wrist; it was after all painted in purple and blue blotches. Maybe he also should have felt angry for what his father did to him or to Peter. Maybe he should have felt scared that he didn’t know the whereabouts of his old man. Maybe he should have felt safe that Peter was watching over him at the moment, or for most of his adult life. Maybe, maybe, maybe. What an uncertain word, so in loose in its ends, so undefined.

But he didn’t feel hurt, he didn’t feel bruised, he didn’t feel heated and he didn’t feel safe. He simply felt nothing at all. He didn’t want to feel nothing though. He wanted sadness to devour him, he wanted rage to play with him and he wanted the pain to justify him. But those things were not meant to be, they were not to be felt, they were not to be envisioned.

Instead he closed his eyes and cursed inwardly at the tears he knew were leaking out at them. This was a dream, a nightmare, a hallucination, right? Right, he said to himself, that’s all it is, a figment of his imagination. He probably just drank too much wine and fell asleep on his balcony. None of this really happened. But the touch of Peter’s hand wiping his tears away with a tissue told him it did happen.

“He’s in jail, he won’t hurt you anymore. I promise.”

But Neal knew that his father’s actions hurt him in a way that could never be erased. It would always be the same; the ache, the longing, the betrayal. The only thing Neal knew would change is the rust that would layer those steel bars that kept him away from his father’s monstrosity.

A half hour later Peter glanced at Neal from behind the newspaper he had open in front of his face. He watched as the younger man lay his bruised back against lumpy pillows and stare with his one good eye at the television. It smelled like plastic and the taupe color embedded throughout the floor and walls made him nauseous. Even though the volume was on high, Peter could hear how ragged his breathing was. He could see how careful Neal was when he shifted his body so he wouldn’t aggravate the raw joints.

“Stop it,” Neal whispered.

Peter sighed and put the newspaper down. He should have known better than to think Neal wouldn’t know he was looking at him. He also knew his throat must have hurt like hell. He spoke in low whispers, his vocal chords unable to achieve anything higher due to the strain.

“Sorry,” Peter offered. And he was.

Neal glanced at him and then at the ground. He gave a short nod and returned his gaze to the box with sounds coming out of it.

*************

When the doctor came in later that afternoon, Peter thought she was too young. She didn’t look older than 16. He didn’t like that. She made the determination that Neal needed a higher dosage of morphine. Peter didn’t like that either. Either Neal was in pain and didn’t say anything about it, or this young lady was in the wrong profession.

Peter went with his second assumption and decided the young doctor was wet behind the ears, or her pre-school sneakers, whichever got soaked first. He knew Neal was given too much medication when his good eye became glassy and unfocused. A strange and uncomfortable smile played along the corners of his mouth.

“Peter?” Neal asked as he reached his arm out to the older man.

“Shh . . . remember don’t talk above a whisper okay?”

“Kay . . . can you do me a favor?” he whispered with that strange smile.

“Sure.”

“Call Kate.”

Peter’s eyes widened slightly, shocked at the request, but then angered beyond the bounds of what fury was supposed to embody.

“Call her. Tell her I’m here. She must be worried to death.”

The air inside Peter’s lungs hitched within them on the double meaning behind those words, the unfortunate truth was painfully hidden from the man who spoke them.

“I know you said I should let her go, that she was no good for me, but I love her Peter. I love her so much. I’m going to marry her you know that?”

“Yea, Neal. I know.”

“She’s my girl. Please call her. I miss her. I felt like I haven’t seen her in a long time. She gets worried if I don’t call her.”

Peter bit his lip. He nodded and stepped outside the room. He couldn’t listen anymore. His fury took over his entire being and he stormed down the hallway. He saw the 16 year old doctor and walked right in her direction.

“Agent Burke, is everything okay?”

Peter didn’t even answer her. He threw his hands up as he walked past her and her clipboard went flying through the air. He pushed open the steel doors and the wind hit his face in an abusive way. He had to leave, he had to go, he had to see that monster that was unfortunately Neal's father.

********

“You’re a goddamn animal, you know that?” Peter sneered as he looked at the man through the clear glass. He decided the color orange suited him comfortably well.

“So what does that make you, a saint?” James Bennett retorted.

Peter chucked a condescending laugh. “You don’t get it do you? You hurt him. You almost killed him. You almost killed your own son!”

“He deserved it.”

“I was wrong about you.”

“And how is that?”

“I always thought that a father walking out on his son at such a young age for his own selfish reasons was heartless; but now I see it was the best thing you ever did for Neal. I can't imagine what growing up in a house with you there would have been like.”

“Yea. He turned out alright didn’t he? Do you think that pretty little bracelet of his will every come off his ankle? _Agent_ Burke?”

“There's a difference between forging signatures and attempting to murder your own flesh. He’ll be free one day I’ll make sure of it, you on the hand will stay here for a long, long, time. I’ll also make goddamn sure of that.”

**********

Two days later, Peter was following Neal up the stairs of June’s. He didn’t say anything when Neal leaned against the banister after six steps to catch his breath. He let him take his time. He could take all the time he needed Peter decided.

Neal entered his room wearily. He wasn’t sure he should have come back here. And then when he saw the chair knocked over, the shattered glass, and his specks of blood littering the wooden floor he knew for goddamn sure that he should have gone elsewhere.

“You okay?” Peter asked. That was a dumb question he realized as he saw Neal’s eyes glaze over the spot where he lay after his father struck him repeatedly.

“I . . . I want to go to a different room I think.” His breathing became erratic. He knew if he didn’t leave he was going to have a full blow panic attack.

“You want to come to back to my house?”

Neal didn’t answer. He couldn’t. It was happening. The panic attack. Or maybe it wasn’t. That pain in his stomach was back. It curled around his spine and seemed to poke a hole in his stomach.

Peter saw it happen in slow motion before it ever really did. He placed his hand on Neal’s shoulders and guided him out of the room into the hallway. “Put your head down,” he instructed.

“I-I c-can’t,” Neal squeezed out as the air left his chest, sure to never return again.

“Yes you can, focus on my shoes, Neal.”

“I can’t do it!” he screamed in total panic. He grabbed his chest, hoping the hit would knock some oxygen into it.

“You’re going to put your head down, look at my shoes and breathe,” Peter said firmly.

Neal put his head down because really, he had no other options. It was this or death.

“El bought these shoes for me. They were on sale and she had a coupon. I told her about three times I wanted the brown ones. First time I wore them I had blisters the size of moon craters. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings so I kept on wearing ‘em.”

Neal looked at Peter’s shoes and listened to him ramble on about them. He noticed the little nicks in them, how they were frayed at the edge. He thinks he saw a faint scratch at the tip of it too. He became fixated on the cheap leather. He didn’t even realize that he was easily taking deep breathes, the kind you would take after running a mile in under eight minutes.

Finally, Neal lifted his head. Peter was still babbling some nonsense about the shoes or perhaps it was coupons. He didn’t hear the words, he didn’t care about them so much, he did care though about the voice soothing him. “Thank you.”

Peter gave him a reassuring smile, like it was on his list of automatic things to do in life. “Lets go downstairs and have some tea.”

Neal nodded and headed for the stairs. “I wish so much that my father could have been like you.”

Neal was already five steps down before Peter responded. He doesn’t think he heard him. “Me too, Neal, me too.”


End file.
